Replacing the Bridge on a Variax 300
by mashgear on 2012-12-17 14:18:20

I have been reading all of the posts on replacing the bridge on a Variax 300 with a LR Baggs or Graphtech tune-o-matic. I'm just about to start this project myself. I want to understand the wiring in the current 300 bridge before I invest in a new piezo tune-o-matic. I notice that the connector to the bridge has eight wires coming out of it. The outside two wires are black. So I assume that the inside 6 go to each of the 6 piezo pickups. Are the two outside black wires not used? Are they grounds? Do they connect to anything on the bridge? Thanks for any help you can offer. --Alan

Re: Replacing the Bridge on a Variax 300
by amx05462 on 2012-12-18 06:48:06

the two black wires ground the pcb to the main board. the current pickups have one wire eachto the pcb under the bridge plate. the current pickups contact ground to the bridge plate through there metal case. to the saddle to the bridge plate with the pressure of the tuned spring.

just curous.. why go to a tunomatic when the guitar is already setup like a strat..

also id take into consideration that the tunomatic may very well sit too high for the guitar even when bottomed out.

and the current setup is more versatile when it comes to making ajustments

Re: Replacing the Bridge on a Variax 300
by mashgear on 2012-12-19 04:55:12

Thanks. That helps. So there's a mounting screw connecting the bridge PCB to the current bridge. Can I just connect the ground wire for the new tune-o-matic pickups to that screw or do I have to splice it directly to the two black ground wires headed to the main board?

I'm putting on a Bigsby B5 trem, so I need the tune-o-matic. Understand about the bridge height. I plan on routing out the bridge cavity in the guitar body a little to lower the tune-o-matic. I have two Variax's: a 500 and a 300, so this is my Variax to experiment with.

Re: Replacing the Bridge on a Variax 300
by mashgear on 2012-12-19 05:11:59

Okay, I think I found the answer to this on another post... the ground on the tune-o-matic goes to the mounting screw on the bridge PCB. Thanks again for your help.

Re: Replacing the Bridge on a Variax 300
by amx05462 on 2012-12-19 08:28:42

yes thats correct. you have to remember that the screw also grounds the bridge plate as well to the main board. not sure if youll have to run a ground to the bigsby as in a conventinal guitar .. might not hurt to just do that..

lol its a funy coincidence that i transplanted my variax and other things into an epiphone dot... and put a fender style trem on the dot rather than have to buythe tune o matic... i had already invested in the graphtech pickups for the 300..

Re: Replacing the Bridge on a Variax 300
by mashgear on 2012-12-19 10:18:21

Okay, one last concern... string noise from the Graphtech bridge piezo's when the Bigsby is used. Do you think that will be a problem? I've read that the Graphtech string contact points are teflon impregnated. That's good. But I get string noise on my 500 from just moving barre chords up and down the fretboard (switching to flatwound strings helped that problem). I'd hate to set this whole thing up and get scrapping string noise every time I used the Bigsby. Know anyone who's actually tried this? Thanks again for words of wisdom.

Re: Replacing the Bridge on a Variax 300
by amx05462 on 2012-12-19 13:03:50

i dont have and answer on that one . as i said i set mine up with a fender style tremelo.

the strings move withthe saddles not over. anything iv used a bigsby on has a roller nut and roller bridge. . were i to take a guess id say the wound strings will give you a problem. also because graphtech has there pickups embeded in composit. id think you would have a wear factor to deal with down the road. vs lr baggs having the metal case.

but i found the graphtech response to be much better and more even..

id guess that if you dive bomb then you could have a noise problem if you just use the bigsby to add slight tremelo then with flat wounds you should be ok.. again ive never had to deal with that on a variax.

Re: Replacing the Bridge on a Variax 300
by mashgear on 2013-01-06 11:11:51

Thanks for all of the group support on this project. See the attached. It came out great. I had to shim the neck a little. But the Graphtech and Bigsby sound great. Looks cool too IMHO. I think I'm also going to swap out the tuners for locking Schallers.

Re: Replacing the Bridge on a Variax 300
by TheRealZap on 2013-01-06 14:43:58

i put the planet wave autotrims on mine... they're locking and great!

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